These past two days have
really flown by! Once again, the secrets
of Trier unveiled themselves, leaving the entire group standing mouths-opened
in the sublime of the Ancient Roman Empire.
To actually allow you to experience a fraction of our adventures, let’s
give a little history lesson:
Trier was founded a little
over 2200 years by the Roman Empire when Augustus (or Octavian, if you prefer)
was the Emperor of Rome. This city
marked the farthest area into Germania that the Romans were able to reach. So they set up shop in Trier for around 500
years. During that time, the Romans went
through many drastic changes, especially when Emperor Konstantin decreed
Christianity legal and the persecution of Christians illegal, thus allowing a
foothold for missionaries and the like.
Around the end of this period, the Roman Empire was split into 5
different areas, each with a Roman capital city, Trier being one of them. Trier maintained an enormous amount of
economic, social, and political power over the course of 200 years. However, the whole of Empire was extremely
weak and eventually, Trier was the target of the Franks, under Charlemagne, who
conquered the Romans, took over the town of Trier and started running things
their own way. This period lasted for
around 400 years. During the medieval
period Trier maintain its influence as a great city, being “shared” by Franks,
Muslims, Catholics, and Protestants.
Recent archeological discoveries have been made, ruins restored, and the
focus on the history of the city has once again become important to people of
all races, ethnicities, and religions.
In fact many people in the U.S. have been able to trace many of their
ancestry to Trier!
Okay, so that was the
history of Trier—summed up quite nicely, if I do say so myself. Now on to the meat and potatoes of these last
two days!
In all of my comings and
goings in and around the town, I have come to like Trier more and more each
day. This town and the country of
Germany have so many things to offer and their way of life seems very
efficient. That being said, I do have
one critique: no one seems eager to
engage another with even a smile. This
is not to say that the people of Trier (or Germany for that matter) aren’t
friendly—it’s quite the opposite.
However, their culture is one of intimacy, and not of false
relationships. Not that Americans are
shallow or false, but at times we don’t actually
care how someone is doing we say, “How are you?” in passing. Even a passing smile can be taken as shallow,
but I see both of these things differently.
I see the smile that we give each other as being friendly and as an
extension of a greeting; it can even be used as a conversation starter. In fact, asking how someone is doing in
passing can certainly be shallow, but in my experience, more often than not,
many people are willing to hear you out if you are having a bad day—they may not be able to help, but sometimes
it’s enough to simply have a listening ear.
These two actions are something that I really miss. Here in Trier, and moreover, Germany, if you
start a conversation with a random person, they will immediately ask if they
know you from somewhere. In fact, you
are met with confused looks and questioning eyes. Even kids do not start random
conversations. Therefore, it’s crucial
to introduce yourself, and being very polite, simply ask your question and move
on. If the conversation leads elsewhere,
so be it, but it not, and sometimes that’s pretty discouraging for someone like
me. That being said, I can actually
understand the reasoning behind this.
However, not acknowledging a smile—that’s something to which I’ve been unable
to adjust or understand. Logically, I
would say that a smile is universally a friendly gesture, but apparently I’d be
wrong. I can’t quite get over the fact
that when I acknowledge someone with a smile, they either confusingly frown
back or immediately look away. UGHHHHH…I
don’t understand.
These two days have been
highly packed with information. Obviously we started our class on Monday, but
we really didn’t get into the meat of the information until Tuesday. Since then, it’s been completely packed with
grammar and vocabulary lessons, tours of historic and modern Trier, as well as
a thousand different bits of information in between. It’s not that the class or anything is too
hard, but it is challenging, especially because it’s so dense. However, I’m pretty sure that the worst is
yet to come…but I’m excited J
The
last thing that I wanted to actually talk about is about an incredible moment
that I had while taking asequence of photos. We were on a hike up through a vineyard on the outskirts of Trier so that we could get to a restaurant on top of the mountain there. We reached the top and there was a long stretch of flat road with a gravel sidewalk for us to walk on. I spied a great shot of a young mother walking with her toddler-aged daughter and decided to capitalize on that scene. Through my lens, the scene became clearer and clearer as they drew nearer. The daughter had down syndrome, and she was beautiful. She was the most beautiful child I had ever scene, just pushing her own baby stroller along, not a care in the world. She kept smiling and taking that fake baby for the ride of its life. It really touched my heart and in the best German that I could muster, I told when she stood next to me, “Du bist sehr schön!” She just smiled and ran away with her stroller. Her mom told me thank you and they both left. That was easily the most memorable moment so far in my experience in Trier.
More to come…
